This Gun's For Hire
by lajulie
Summary: Leia's grief has her sleepwalking through life. Leave it to Han (and the Boss) to help bring her back to the land of the living. Originally posted on Tumblr for Scoundress Saturdays; prompt: "Dancing in the Dark" by Bruce Springsteen.


_Originally posted on Tumblr for Scoundress Saturdays; prompt: "Dancing in the Dark" by Bruce Springsteen._

* * *

 **This Gun's for Hire**

Someone had once told Leia that war was "hours of mind-numbing boredom, broken up by minutes of sheer terror."

She wasn't _bored_ , exactly. There was plenty to be done, and not enough hours in the day to do it. But the mind-numbing part made perfect sense to her. Sitting in the High Council meetings she'd fought so hard to attend, she found herself doing the mental exercises she'd practiced to keep her mind occupied while some hack had droned on in the Imperial Senate. She was well practiced at keeping her face composed and part of her brain engaged, just in case something interesting came up.

The other part of her brain was trying to find something else to occupy itself, and was about a minute away from employing Winter's old trick of imagining her thumb and forefinger crushing the heads of the most boring meeting participants when _he_ popped into her head.

 _Oh, no. No, this is a terrible idea. No._

But there he was in her mind, pulling up a chair and setting his lanky form down next to her. _How's that revolution goin', Your Highnessness? You gonna beat the Empire with a pile of requisition forms, or what?_

The crazy thing was, she agreed with him. But were Han actually in front of her, she would likely be defending the Alliance's processes with as much vehemence as she could muster.

Which, admittedly, was not a lot these days. This feeling of being outside her own body had been happening more and more often lately. She saw herself greet people, participate in meetings, eat meals, give briefings, suggest strategies. But it was as if some other Leia was doing it, a Leia who vacillated between a placid smile and a stern, efficient expression.

And she knew why it was; any halfway intelligent person who had heard of grief could tell you why it was. She didn't need a therapist to tell her what she already knew: _The old Leia doesn't live here anymore. She's with her people now._

She was able to stay inside her body when she talked to Luke, somehow; something about his gentle, open nature and the fact that he had his own grief made it hard to put on a façade for him. And Han, well—Han had a way of sparking something beyond that. Even when they argued.

That must be why he was showing up in her brain right now. Along with Winter, who had such helpful suggestions as _Picturing his ass is a hell of a lot better than exploding Dodonna's head, isn't it?_ and _I'll bet if you fucked him, you'd feel something_.

Leia blinked to clear her head. _This is not helping, Winter._

* * *

After the meeting—and after sternly instructing the Winter in her head to _shut the hell up_ —Leia was actually headed to the _Falcon_ , having been tasked with communicating the new contracting procedures to Han and Chewie in advance of their next run.

She was already feeling a little invigorated, preparing herself to go ten rounds with Han over these changes if she had to. It was strange, how energizing it was to spar with him sometimes; she almost looked forward to it. In fact, Luke had accused her the other day of purposely finding reasons to pick a fight with Han.

She was still a little annoyed with Luke about that.

There was music blaring from the _Falcon_ , which usually meant that Han was in the midst of some kind of repair. She could hear him singing along:

 _I ain't nothing but tired_  
 _Man, I'm just tired and bored with myself_  
 _Hey there baby, I could use just a little help…._

She followed the sound to the maintenance bay, where Han was bent over a connection, but still singing—

 _You can't start a fire  
Can't start a fire without a spark…_

He spotted her, and without missing a beat, grinned and continued singing along, motioning as if he were offering himself to her:

 _This gun's for hire  
Even if we're just dancing in the dark…._

Leia couldn't help herself; he looked so ridiculously goofy in his safety goggles, singing along and motioning to her with that crooked grin on his face. She laughed, loudly, and he looked extraordinarily pleased with himself.

He pushed himself out of the maintenance bay and reached over to turn down the volume on the audio player, then pulled the goggles up to his forehead. "Enjoying my singing?"

Leia kept laughing. "Quite the performance," she said.

He was still grinning at her, but he was almost studying her, as if he could see through her. Leia suddenly felt self-conscious. "What?"

He shook his head. "Nothing. Just—like seeing your real laugh, is all." Before she could react to that, he'd switched gears. "Got some business for me?"

"New contracting procedures. Before that run to Vassek."

He motioned to her to hand over the datapad, then wiped his hands on his bloodstripes before taking it. "Sorry. Hands were dirty." He looked it over quickly, then signed his approval and handed it back to her.

 _Wait. No changes? No arguing over terms?_ Leia was surprised, and almost—disappointed.

"What's the matter, Princess? Sorry that I didn't put up a fight?" he asked, as if he'd just read her mind.

"No, of course not, it's—"

That searching look came back to his face, and now his voice was lower. "Y'know, Sweetheart, there's more than one way to feel alive."

Her eyes widened.

"Tell you what," he said, his hazel eyes twinkling at her, "let's go 'borrow' a couple of speeders, go for a joyride or something. You strike me as a woman with a need for speed."

That was not what she had been expecting him to suggest. At all. She wasn't sure whether she was disappointed or relieved.

He grinned again, looking pleased at having surprised her twice in the course of five minutes. "But first—we gotta finish out this song." He took the datapad from her and turned up the music again, twirling her to the raw beat and singing along:

 _Can't start a fire_  
 _Sitting 'round crying over a broken heart_  
 _This gun's for hire_  
 _Even if we're just dancing in the dark…_


End file.
